The Predictability Paradox
“Prediction needs to be the antidote for predictability.” YossarianLives! claims to be a metaphorical search engine that uses algorithms to assist its users to acquire new, disparate knowledge. They value the idea of having a creative mind to expand knowledge beyond the unknown, unlike what predictable search engines offer, such as Google and Amazon, who place their customers into their comfort-zone, known as the “filter bubble.” Cass Sunstein expresses that the filter bubbles should be popped because of the “echo chambers [that can] incline us towards embracing narrow—if not extremist—
world-views, eschewing diversity, and favouring conformity.” YossarianLives! focuses on popping this bubble, bringing up a paradox that is quite interesting to think about: using predictive technology to predict what users are not predicted to search for. Jarno Koponen suggests that “there needs to be a curiosity-provoking experience—an intervention—that enables you to go beyond the familiar. An experience that exposes you to new choices and diversity. An adaptive interface and system that learns about the things that might surprise you.”
Could this new paradoxical predictability technology be the revolutionary way that marketers create more sales and profit? Could companies somehow manipulate YossarianLives!’s algorithms to create a broader horizon of customers as they broaden the horizons of their customers? I think that for these predictive interfaces to succeed, society also has to be reciprocally receptive to the new, potentially desired information that is presented to them.